BMW is due to release a slew of new turbo diesel engines in the United States throughout 2013 and 2014.

Among those in the diesel lineup is the F30 3 Series sedan diesel, due out in the first half of 2013; the F31 3 Series touring, due out in the second half of 2013; the F10 5 Series diesel, due out in the third quarter of 2013; the X5d diesel, due out at the end of 2013; the 7 Series diesel, due in the first half of 2014, and the X3d diesel, due in the first half of 2014.

According to F30Post, a 180 HP 4-cylinder engine may be assigned to 20d or 25d models while a 255 HP 6-cylinder engine may be assigned to 28d, 30d or 35d models. However, no official announcements have been made in that regard.

The Jetta is not the "poster child". That would be the Passat. The Passat has urea treatment, so its exhaust is cleaner and its efficiency is higher because it doesn't use as much fuel for emissions treatment, resulting in higher MPGs.

WTF are you talking about? The 2012 tdi passat uses the same exact motor as the 2012 tdi jetta. It is that fact why i am holding off on it because it is too underpowered for me in a car the size of the passat, but ok in the jetta.

not sure what your definition of poster child is... without a doubt the single car in the US that has perpetuated and kept the diesel movement alive is the jetta. Prior to the 2012 tdi passat, the last year it was available in diesel was 2005!

The 2012 Passat uses urea injection, unlike the Jetta which only uses DPF. Both cars are rated at the same MPG despite the Passat weighing nearly 300 lbs more. Yes, it feels slightly underpowered compared to the more nimble Jetta.

The irony is we drove our 2006 Jetta TDI to the test drive and came away underwhelmed by the performance of the TDI Passat. VW should make the 3.0 TDI as an optional package for the Passat. The Q7/Toureg are balanced with the 3.0 so the Passat will be enjoyable to drive and still frugal on fuel.

In related news, was eyeing the used market for a 2006 Toureg TDI... the one with the V10. I don't care how many quarts of oil it needs or what comes out the exhaust, driving that truck made me smile. Unfortunately, my wife is insisting on a third row so Q7 is taking the lead right now.

quote: As can be seen, "clean diesel" vehicles are generally no "worse" with respect to total well-to-wheels emissions than the cleanest gasoline vehicles due to the nature of the very low volatility of diesel fuel and overall lower emissions in the WTP phase, even though the Passat TDI is "only" certified T2B5/ULEV II, while the 2.5 gasoline version is certified T2B2/PZEV. In fact, total well-to-wheels emissions are lower across-the-board in the case of the VW Passat TDI.

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Based on these EPA emission factors, even the Euro-spec Passat TDI has lower WTW criteria pollutant emissions across-the-board than the PZEV version of the gasoline Passat.

Plus, the 32.80 MPG rating used for the TDI is not representative of many TDI drivers who use the car for long highway commutes. The highway MPG of the 2012 Passat TDI is much much better. If someone buys the car to mainly use for short stop/go trips then they bought the wrong type of car.

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